On Thursday night, Darnell Nurse added another milestone to his NHL career as the Edmonton Oilers took down the Minnesota Wild with a decisive 7-1 victory. Nurse notched two third-period assists to hit the 200-career-assist mark, a sneaky testament to his offensive abilities on the Oilers’ blue line since being drafted 7th overall in 2013.

The milestone assist came on Troy Stecher’s third-period tally, where Nurse’s well-timed pass set up the defender with some space to create a lane for his second goal in an Oilers jersey. Just 11 minutes later, Nurse added another primary assist on a feed to Derek Ryan, who scored his first goal of the season and emptied what was left of the Xcel Energy Center. Those two points brought Nurse to 201 career assists, a milestone that surprised me after noticing the math on how he picks up helpers at the rate he does.

Did you know that Darnell Nurse gets assists in basically 30% of his games? I didn’t.

In his 666 regular-season games with the Oilers, Nurse has arguably taken more heat than almost any Edmonton defenceman I can remember. Still, it’s hard to argue how important he is to the team’s blue line, and we got a good taste of that when he missed three games after the high hit from Ryan Reaves. Whether throwing hits, logging big minutes, or chipping in offensively, Darnell Nurse is a key piece to the Oilers’ blue line and Stanley Cup Aspirations.

While some fans may beat his contract to death or feel like he’s incapable of improving — spoiler: he’s been fantastic this season — the numbers speak for themselves and 200 assists in the NHL is no small feat. With the Oilers clawing their way back up the Pacific Division standings after another slow start to their season, milestones like this are cool moments for players who have been with us for a long time now.

Even though I full expect to read comments here on the site or on social media about this being a nothing moment in Nurse’s career, I think it’s awesome to see him get rewarded for the way he’s playing. From my side of the laptop screen, this might be the best Nurse has ever played, and that’s a massive win for an Oilers team that needed guys to step up on the back end. We saw what life was life without Nurse after that Toronto game and it wasn’t pretty, and now the hope is that he can keep this train rolling because he’s been awesome.

Congrats on the achievement, Darryl, and here’s to plenty more multi-point nights as the season rolls on.